DA Says Not Mass Murder Victim – Questions Arise in Body Identification

by Houston (AP)

Authorities have identified the 21st of 27 bodies dug up during the mass murders investigation of last summer but District Attorney Carol Vance doesn’t feel the victim was part of the sex-torture killings. Vance says his office is unlikely to seek any criminal indictments in connection with the latest identification. The body was identified Friday as John Manning Sellars, 18, son of Mr. and Mrs. Manning R. Sellars of Orange, whose body was recovered at High Island in Jefferson County last August. Vance said several things indicate Sellars may not be a victim in the series of slayings:

• His body was found two miles from the other five bodies dug up on the beach at High Island.
• He was shot four times in the chest with a large caliber weapon. The other victims were killed by strangulation or with a small caliber weapon.
• He was fully clothed, unlike the other victims.

However, Vance said Sellars was a young male, like all the other victims. Police say that Dean Arnold Corll. 33 was the leader of the ring which lured youths to parties where they were homosexually raped, tortured and murdered. Corll was shot to death last August 8 by Elmer Wayne Henley, 18, in a death later ruled to be self-defense. Henley, and David. Owen Brooks, 19, are charged in the slayings. Brooks, named in four indictments, has not had a trial date set. Henley is due for trial July 1 in San Antonio in six of the deaths. Friday District Court Judge Preston Dial appointed former state representative Rudy Esquivel, a San Antonio lawyer, to assist Henley’s two lawyers in the case, Assistant District Attorney Don Lambright said Sellars was reported missing July 12 and his body was found last August 10. Sellars was not mentioned in any statement made by Henley and Brooks about the slayings, he said.

Dr. Joseph A. Jachimczyk, county medical examiner, said Mrs. Sellars contacted him about a week ago to see if her son might be among those bodies discovered last summer and not identified. Dr. Jachimcyzvk said he compared dental records, lock of hair from a Mother’s Day card and clothing and found 14 points of identity. Mrs. Sellers said although she does not think her son knew Corll, Henley or Brooks nor any of the victims who have been identified, he told a younger brother, a week before he disappeared, “Somebody’s out to kill me. They are going bury me at the beach.” She said her son said it was all a joke when she questioned him about the statement. Mrs. Sellers said her son disappeared two days short of is 19th birthday. His burned car was found about a week later in a wooded area three miles from Starks, La.